Telecom a Top-Shelf Priority as Senate Commerce Takes Shape

“It’s a big part of what the Commerce Committee does in terms of jurisdiction, so we’ll be paying very careful attention to what happens on that subcommittee and working with the chair and the ranking member,” Thune told us at the Capitol. “And hopefully if things go well, doing something in the form of a rewrite.”

New Democrats on Commerce next year will, according to a roster circulated Friday among industry officials, include Sens. Tom Udall of New Mexico and Joe Manchin of West Virginia, as well as Rep. Gary Peters of Michigan, an incoming senator. Commerce will have two fewer Democratic members in the 114th Congress, 11 rather than 13. Udall has particular telecom experience as the chairman of the Appropriations Financial Services Subcommittee. He has called on FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler to testify before him multiple times.

Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., chaired the Communications Subcommittee in the current Congress that’s ending. Pryor focused on rural broadband and emergency communications issues in his time as chairman. Industry lobbyists and Capitol Hill staffers frequently observed that Senate subcommittees have less clout than House subcommittees, with roles often subject to full committee chairs. A Thune spokeswoman reiterated that Thune has no plans to fold the subcommittee into the full committee, disputing rumors of possible actions a Democratic Senate staffer had heard. Pryor lost his re-election bid in November. Subcommittee ranking member Roger Wicker, R-Miss., will become the new chairman.

Wicker Favors 'Even-Handedness'

Wicker wants “focus on even-handedness across the board and in particular looking at rural America,” he told us at the Capitol this month. “I’m not ready to get into specifics.”

Wicker noted “there’s always talk” of overhauling the Communications Act but didn't elaborate on plans to proceed with a rewrite. Riding on the Senate subway, Wicker turned to Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis.: “I would think people from Wisconsin and Mississippi could agree on protecting rural Americans’ access to telecommunications, don’t you think?”

“We all love telecommunications,” Baldwin, not a member of the Communications Subcommittee, told Wicker. “Needs to have access, needs to have a thick pipeline.”

“It’s always by definition the most important subcommittee because it has the broadest jurisdiction,” said Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., who's retiring. “Pryor won’t be there. Who will be there for the Democrats is not my decision but Bill Nelson’s," he said, referring to the Florida Democrat. "But we’re on a roll on telecommunications.”

Little clear sense of the subcommittee’s top Democrat has emerged since Pryor’s loss, with several names emerging as contenders. Nelson will become Commerce ranking member. Subcommittee seniority among Democrats who will remain in the next Congress runs in descending order of Sens. Barbara Boxer of California; Maria Cantwell of Washington; Claire McCaskill of Missouri; Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota; and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut. Other subcommittee Democrats, lower in seniority, include Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Ed Markey of Massachusetts and Brian Schatz of Hawaii.

Boxer has long been seen as uninterested in being ranking subcommittee member, given bigger committee opportunities and, according to the circulated roster of Commerce members, will no longer be a member of Commerce. Cantwell dismissed the idea of leading subcommittee Democrats when asked at the Capitol. She shrugged and pointed at McCaskill as her guess for the ranking member. “Probably won’t be,” McCaskill told us, “because I have the opportunity to be ranking member of a full committee and I also have an opportunity to be ranking member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.” Those are “great” opportunities and McCaskill “can only do two,” meaning the Communications Subcommittee leadership is probably not in the cards, she said. McCaskill suspected Klobuchar would be the likely choice. Blumenthal said he didn’t know anything. “Well, I can’t tell you that,” Nelson remarked. “I can tell I’m going to be the ranking member on the Commerce Committee, the full committee.”

Spokespeople for Klobuchar didn’t comment on her potential interest. She chaired the Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee this Congress. She has actively pursued some telecom and media priorities, such as pressing for smartphone kill switch legislation and holding a hearing on wireless competition.

Rewrite Looming

The shape of the subcommittee will shift in other ways.

Sen. Mark Begich, D-Alaska, lost re-election, and Sen. John Walsh, D-Montana, dropped his re-election bid. No Republican members lost re-election or are retiring, but lobbyists have indicated some may leave, with one citing Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C. A Scott spokesman didn't comment. Some incoming GOP senators have indicated interest in these committee issues. Rep. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., is an active House Communications Subcommittee member who won a Colorado Senate seat last month. Gardner “would love to continue the work that we’ve been able to pursue in the House by either serving on the Commerce Committee or broader work in the Senate,” he told us at the Capitol, citing the broad jurisdiction in the House Commerce Committee and his telecom interest specifically.

Several members played up tech, telecom and media ambitions, eyeing next year. Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., has championed FCC process legislation. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., created an agenda out of multiple wireless bills, the latest of which he hoped to introduce in the final days of the 113th Congress (see 1412110036). McCaskill has ripped into pay-TV industry billing practices and wanted legislation, nearly holding a hearing on the issue this month (see 1412030047). Blumenthal and Markey nearly stalled Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act reauthorization this year over its repeal of the set-top box integration ban and have long tracked telecom and media issues with focus on consumer advocacy. Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., released a tech agenda in October that included sections criticizing federal preemption of state municipal broadband restrictions and rural call completion problems. Several members, from Markey and Cantwell among Democrats to Ted Cruz of Texas and Roy Blunt of Missouri among Republicans, loudly proclaimed strong views on net neutrality this year.

Thune told us a key priority early next year is an overhaul of the Communications Act. It's a process that House Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., and Communications Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., began a year ago.

“We’ve been consulting with our colleagues in the House, with Chairman Upton and Walden, and we’d like to do it fairly early on,” Thune said. “But there’s going to be, as you know, a very busy schedule come January. So there’ll be a lot of other stuff queued up so it’ll take some time, probably, to process the number of issues that we have to deal with in a telecom update. But I think there’s a real interest in doing it among members of the committee.”

Nelson, asked about overhauling the Communications Act, said, “I’m looking for a think-outside-the-box solution to this, and I call it Title X, so we’re exploring that now.” The Communications Act currently lacks such a title. He had previously invoked “Title X” in an interview with us when asked about net neutrality and the White House backing for a Communications Act Title II approach (see 1411130049). The war over net neutrality has largely focused on whether broadband should be classified as a Title I information service or Title II telecom service (see 1412120055">1412120055).